How to Recover From a Bad Interview

Topics:

January 30, 2013

We’ve all been there: That moment when you close an office door and all you want to do is hit your head against a wall because you just know that interview did not go well. You didn’t ask the right questions, you should have used this word instead of that word, you forgot to mention the skills you learned from your last job. Instead, you keep your shoulders back and leave the head-smacking until later, when you are safely out of view of the company’s employees, who are surely judging you.

A bad interview can leave you feeling down and unmotivated, but it doesn’t always have to be that way. Katie Douthwaite of Mashable outlines a few ways you can quickly recover from a bad interview and how you can climb your way back to the top of the candidate list.

First, don’t overanalyze the interview. You’ll throw yourself into a frenzy of assessing every word you used, every hand gesture and even the tone of your voice. Keep in mind that every little mistake you think you made during the interview probably went unnoticed.

If, however, during your analyzing you do realize that you missed some vital information or made a major fumble during the interview, you can still salvage it. Before doing anything, you must first decide just how important it is to make the clarification. As Douthwaite points out, sometimes it will just draw the interviewers to your mistake, while other times it can do some serious damage control.

Do You Know What You're Worth?

If you decide the interview fumble needs to be corrected, simply add a short comment in a follow-up email to the interviewer, along with a thank-you note. This email should be short and sweet, not more than two paragraphs, so make sure your comments are absolutely necessary.

Sometimes you’ll be able to recover from the bad interview and maybe even snag the gig. If you are still not able to turn things around, you can be sure you’ll always remember to mention that one internship or clarify your educational experience the next time around.

To learn more about how to recover from a bad job interview, click here.